If Cancer Was a Gift

I Would Have Returned It a Long Time Ago

by Laura Parisi King, LMSW

It is absolutely maddening to me
when people say that cancer is a blessing
or a gift. “It wasn’t until I got
cancer that I started to live my life,”
they say. “I didn’t realize how wonderful
my life was until I got cancer.”
“After going through treatments for
my cancer, I learned to meditate and
started to take yoga classes.” “It’s the
best thing that’s ever happened to
me.” ARGHHH!

As a social worker, a woman living
with stage IV breast cancer, and the
caregiver for my husband who is living
with advanced prostate cancer,
I can tell you firsthand that cancer is
not a gift. It is not a blessing. It is
nothing more than a horrible, relentless,
painful, uncertain, and frightening
disease. Calling it anything else simply
validates the cancer as the powerful
force in your life when in reality the
powerful force is you.

How wonderful it would be to give yourself,
not cancer, the credit.

You had the courage to live your
life in spite of this tremendous challenge.
You came to the realization that
your life is wonderful even with cancer
as a part of your reality. You made
the decision to take yoga and to meditate.
Cancer did not make any of those
decisions for you. How wonderful it
would be to give yourself, not cancer,
the credit for that.

I would love to see the men,
women, and children who face this
disease and take something positive
from it be recognized for their bravery,
strength, courage, and determination.
It takes a certain type of person to
forge ahead and bring meaning to the
unfortunate experience of having cancer.
How easy it would be to curl up
in a ball, lay in bed day after day and
say, “poor me.” How easy it would
be to become a bitter, angry, and resentful
person. Quite frankly, I get
offended when people say that cancer
is a gift. If cancer was a gift, I would
have returned it a long time ago.

In a way, I respect those people
who choose to see cancer that way.
Perhaps they are trying to see the light
through the darkness in the only way
they know how. But I encourage my
clients and my readers to see it another
way. Instead of being thankful
for the “gift” of cancer, be thankful
for the gifts of strength, courage, and
faith. Be thankful for the blessings of
family, friends, and community members
who help
you through the
physical and
emotional pain.
Rejoice in yourself.
Give
yourself much
deserved credit
for being a
fighter, for not
giving up, for
taking a life-changing experience and
making the change a positive one.
Acknowledge yourself as the gift and
the blessing that you truly are.

♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

Laura King is a social
worker, a public speaker, and the author
of the inspirational book Dear Cancer
(available at www.authorhouse.com).

This article was published in Coping® with Cancer magazine,
January/February
2008.